Can aquaculture save the world’s last wild food? That’s the question posed by the cover story of the July 18 issue of Time, which takes a look at the continuing collapse of the world’s fisheries. Fish seems so superabundant on our dinner plates that one can hardly fathom how we could possibly run out. After all, the ocean is so BIG.

Well, the deep blue sea is getting emptier and emptier, and even if the shoreline seems far away, the fisheries crisis is going to start hitting close to home—soon.

That’s the outlook, grim as it is, forecast by author Paul Greenberg in his recent book, Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food. Greenberg dives into the topic with gusto—in part, one has to imagine, because the oceanic crisis is so catastrophic. Full story »

Analystas are rushing in from all sides to examine the causes of the UK riots. Are they about politics and economics? Or is it merely an opportunity for thugs to steal stuff? All we know for sure is that it’s anarchy in the UK and that Saturday’s opening day match between Spurs and Everton has been postponed.

One sobering development, though, should make British citizens sit up and take notice. For that matter, those of us in America and in every other democracy in the world (to the extent that the US can be called a democracy) need to be paying very close attention to the latest move by Brit Prime Minister David Cameron, who is calling on Parliament to consider enacting social media bans. Full story »

by Robert S. Becker

Doom and gloom, double trouble,
Shakedowns Work, RuiNation Rubble.

It ain’t easy being the last eternal optimist caught in the recent thicket of appalling, if inevitable melodrama. Who doubted the finale, a last-second ceasefire that left no principled adults standing? But unmitigated disaster has only one payoff for non-combatants, namely, the invaluable lessons alert survivors learn. If there are any . . . lessons or survivors.

When only confusion stalks the land, then let us feast on the going fare. Perhaps “optimism” overstates, depending in part on those guilty of self-inflicted failure learning from their own myopia. Full story »

When I moved to Denver, Colorado from Western New York five years ago, several differences became immediately apparent between both regions. Denver has significantly nicer weather, simpler road structures and younger history than most places in New York. When I moved from Denver to Chicago, Illinois three years later, I witnessed more cultural differences. In addition to the faster pace and more expensive cost of living, locals’ demeanors in Chicago became my most noteworthy observation of all. Even after two years of living amidst the city’s hustle and bustle, I have found Midwesterners overall to be among the most approachable and down-to-earth group of people I’ve ever encountered. Full story »

My editor does not want me to post this blog. That should tell you something about the sensitivity around the topic I am about to discuss.

First, some background. Not too long ago I wrote a post in which I observed that pudgy Southern teen girls often grow up to be pudgy women. I expected some reaction, but I didn’t expect the reaction I got, which was to get pelted from every angle. The right and the left. Men and women. Old and young.  It was as if I spit into the ocean and caused a tsunami.

OK, at the bottom of the page before you post a blog there is a small box that says “Check to allow comments.” If you check that box, as I do, and write about controversial topics in provocative ways, as I do, then you shouldn’t whine (even though I do.) Full story »

Samuel Maynard Hicks is a skinny and shy-looking youngster, yet his eyes burn with fervour in a face mottled with ash and dust.  His fingers are blackened; soot and grime mark out his fingernails as his hands twist a dog-eared copy of “The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money” by John Maynard Keynes.

“It is essential that we stimulate the economy,” he says earnestly. “Keynes believed that, no matter how unproductive an action may appear, if it results in increased aggregate market activity we must do it.  We’ve let the government have a go with macroprudential stimulus and quantitative easing, but people just won’t spend.  So we’re giving them a reason to start building again by destroying their businesses, burning down their homes and stealing their stuff.” Full story »

While Christopher Monckton, Viscount of Brenchley, was in New Zealand on a speaking tour, he was interviewed by Country99 TV News reporter Benedict Collins. Collins asked Monckton a number of questions related to his rejection of peer review and a detailed debunking of one of Monckton’s presentations by Prof. John Abraham of the University of St. Thomas. Monckton was not amused, as you can watch for yourself below.

Lots of ink and many bits are currently being spilled analyzing S&P’s downgrade of the credit ratings of the United States to AA+ from AAA late Friday. Most of the talking heads in America continue to pretend to not to understand the dynamic of this action, and S&P, which hasn’t covered itself in glory over the past several years, admittedly, is taking a lot of flak for this—even Warren Buffett disagrees, and of course, Buffett is never wrong (except for those times when he is). Paul Krugman, with whom I normally agree, takes a number of pot shots, but I think misses the larger picture. Eschaton has an elegant little summary that a number of people, including Krugman, think summarizes what our reaction should be (and Eschaton, aka Duncan Black, is also an economist).
Full story »

Introduction

If I had read the instructions more clearly, these photographs would have gotten me into the photography program at the Yale University School of Art. But, like an idiot, I submitted this portfolio in print form rather than on 35mm slides as was required. Anyway, long story short: I didn’t get into Yale, though I did come close. Damned instructions.

Anyway, what you are about to read and view are poems and photographs I created while living in Tokyo in 1987 and 1988. The words were not specifically written for the images, but I paired each piece of text with each photo as a kind of experiment which I thought ended up working. You will note that all the photos are of Japanese drunks and homeless people. I was not on a social crusade, as I might be today. I was merely out to document an aspect of Japanese society which I could not believe existed. And it still exists, as my wife and I discovered during our trip to Tokyo in 2008. There are still tons of dispossessed in Ueno Park, for example. Full story »

Cross-posted from Truthout.

Republican assaults on social service programs have finally yielded some significant advances, with the Obama Administration offering to push the eligibility age for Medicare up from age 65 to 67. Also, as part of a bargain to raise the debt ceiling, the administration offered to dial down cost-of-living increases in Social Security benefits.

But it’s Medicaid, which, as the health provider of last resort for the most vulnerable segment of society, has long been a tempting target for Republicans. To remind the young, to whom Medicaid and Medicare tend to blend together, up to speed, the former is a program jointly funded by the state and federal governments that pays for medical care for those who can’t afford it. Full story »

Here’s a preview of this week’s ArtSunday feature, with some comments from the editor at the end.

King Subway (Tokyo Station)—October, 1988▲ Full story »

by Miles Dean

There’s much self congratulation in Washington these days about the “Deal.”

This represents a false solution to a misidentified problem.

What the deal actually does is to limit debt in the next year and a half and constrain spending by limiting increases in borrowing in the next year and a half to program reductions over the next ten years. Got that? In other words, “I’ll only let you borrow today what you promise to save, later.”

The theatre of the past thirty days has been a wasteful exercise of trying to equate bill paying as the cause of problems brought about by the aftermath of the Bush tax cuts for the rich, fighting two wars while borrowing from the Chinese to pay for them, and prescription drug benefits given without anyone paying for them. Full story »

It has been quite a week. When things happen that I don’t completely understand, I always go back to my childhood and look for inspiration or understanding. Yep. There it is.

When I was a kid, sports were my life. I have the scars to prove it. Hours under an endless June sky were marked by innings, and days that crept by slow in July heat are remembered as quarters in a never-ending football game. We violently imitated every competition we saw on TV, and when we had to, we invented our own contests. I’m still very proud of my brief reign as grand champion of full-contact croquet, a beautiful sport that drew mothers to our park like June bugs to watermelon rinds. Oh, how they screamed. Full story »

Anheuser-Busch InBev wants to sell more Budweiser. That’s because Bud’s market share in the United States has declined for two decades. American shipments fell 7 percent last year. Bud will likely fall from its No. 2 position in best-selling beers as Coors Light speeds past it.

A-B’s corporate response to slowing sales? Repackaging. The corporation has sunk 18 months and untold millions (it won’t say how many) into redesigning the can that contains the same beer. Says A-B executive Rob McCarthy:

The bow tie and the prominence of the bow tie came through both for current drinkers and for potential drinkers as just a powerful symbol of the quality and heritage and authenticity of the brand.

New package. Same beer. New style. Same substance. Well, so what?

Full story »

Here’s the greatest sports quotation of all time. But first, a little background:

On December 29, 1972, the National Hockey League’s Philadelphia Flyers found themselves in Vancouver for a game with the Canucks. The Flyers were known as the “Broad Street Bullies” back then. Fists, punches and dirty stickwork were as much a part of their game as their hockey skills were.

That night, four Flyers went into the stands after someone in the stands reached over the glass and pulled the hair of the Flyers’ Don Saleski as he fought one of the Canucks. (Saleski had long hair, and many players didn’t wear helmets back then.) Well over 100 penalty minutes were called in that game, most of them during a nasty third period. Full story »

We’re living in a time when infrastructure and WPA-type projects would be balm to an ailing economy. As welcome as they are, ideally they should hold out the promise of being both profitable and socially redeeming. Here’s one that fulfills neither requirement.

On July 13 Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, reported the Atomic Heritage Foundation in its newsletter, recommended the “designation” (authorization, presumably) of a Manhattan Project National Park. It would be located in the three main sites of the massive U.S. effort to develop nuclear weapons during World War II: Oak Ridge, Tennessee; Hanford, Washington; and Los Alamos, New Mexico.

In 2003 the Atomic Heritage Foundation, after years of lobbying, first recommended the park to Congress. In 2004 Congress passed legislation mandating that the Secretary of the Interior undertake an evaluation of the project. Apparently, all the requirements have been met. Full story »